


shatters

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Baby Ben Solo, Bonding, Family, Gen, Introspection, POV Han Solo, Parent Han Solo, Pre-Star Wars: The Force Awakens, The Force
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-02 23:03:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13328283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: They had a saying back home about kids like Ben; they’d grow up to have hearts too big for their own good.





	shatters

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Apricot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Apricot/gifts).



The first sign that there was anything wrong was a sharp, shrill cry of terror from Ben—Han would recognize Ben’s voice anywhere, even if he did sound inhuman and altogether unlike himself in his fear—and the sudden, shattering crash of what Han shortly learned was one of the gaudy knickknacks he’d brought back from a trip to Majora Keelis. He’d gone before he’d known Leia was pregnant and only stayed a few days, long enough to slake the wanderlust that itched like a tight and painful sunburn under his collar. His skin felt two sizes too small every time he stepped foot on Hosnian Prime anyway, but before Ben arrived, it had been particularly bad. He wasn’t proud of that, but it served no one if he pretended he wasn’t exactly who he was.

It wasn’t the first time he’d heard Ben shout, nor even the one-hundredth, but it never failed to stop Han’s heart. Nothing about his years in the Rebellion could prepare him for the sheer, egoless horror he felt every time Ben made his pain and displeasure known through the crude methods available to him. If he thought facing down the Death Star was frightening, it had nothing on being responsible for his own offspring, a being who couldn’t fend for himself. Even Luke knew a little something about flying and shooting and fighting, after all, even if he didn’t know the first thing about taking care of himself otherwise.

Anyway. That wasn’t the point here. Luke was a grown man. Ben was a very small child. Totally different things even if they both seemed to exist to give Han heart attacks.

The knickknack—a twisting, monstrous, almost human-shaped figurine plated in gold, silver, and sparkling black—lay in pieces around Ben’s tiny, chubby frame in a full, jagged circle as though it had broken overhead and chose to rain down around him instead of pelting his body with glittering shards of metal. It was solid and sturdy in the way all awful things that didn’t deserve it were, like they were protected by and coated in pure, heavy spite. It had, in fact, survived more than its fair share of falls from its place on the shelf.

The shelf on the other side of the room.

The shelf on the other side of the room that Ben couldn’t reach because a baby-proofed force field kept Ben corralled in the half of the room that had been, until this moment, entirely safe for him to roam and play and explore while Han worked. No knickknacks, no sharp corners, no electrical plugs that Ben could shove his tiny, chubby fingers into. No nothing.

Squalling and red-faced, Ben didn’t even seem to notice Han’s approach until Han reached down to pick him up. He didn’t look hurt as far as Han could see. No scratches, no bumps, no blood. But he shook and screamed against Han’s chest anyway, clutching at Han with a ferocity that staggered Han while his tears soaked into Han’s shirt. The kid had a pair of lungs on him, that was for sure. Han could just hear the mouth on him when he reached his teen years. If he was anything like Han—or Leia, he’d heard plenty of stories—they’d look back on this time of indecipherable, ear-bleeding screeching with fondness.

They had a saying back home about kids like Ben; they’d grow up to have hearts too big for their own good.

A curse, that, as much as it was a blessing. Corellians liked odds. All things flipped good or bad on the turn of a card, yes or no by the roll of a die. The stars aligned this way or that to determine if luck be with you or not. Han hated letting that much of his destiny out of his own hands, never bought into it, but he couldn’t deny that there was something inside of Ben that seemed to exist on a fissure, a fault line ready to crack.

He was a calm baby. Mostly. Far less of a hellion than Han had expected any son of his to be. Most days, he was a blessing. That heart of his was a blessing.

It was only sometimes Han sensed the truth, an intuitive truth, not the Force-driven truth his wife and brother-in-law could sense. His son, and Han knew it even if he didn’t have proof the way they did, felt so much more than the rest of them. Deeply. Too deeply. Some way, some how, Han knew. That calmness was a deception. This crying, fearful, passionate thing wriggling in his arms, that was the truth. Han would protect him from that if he could, if only because he knew feelings were a sucker’s game if you didn’t know how to control them, but—

But, well. There was time. Not like Ben could really understand him yet anyway. He barely knew how to gum at his slurried dinners without making a mess. Teaching an infant about playing your cards close to your vest was also a sucker’s game.

If Leia were here, she’d probably laugh at him for the tilt of his thoughts, but she was at the latest Senate hearing, doing her damnedest to make his New Republic work the way it was supposed. Han Solo had been saved from infamy by government intervention. That was a new one even for him.

“Hey, there,” Han said, as gentle as he knew how to be, quiet, hoping to assuage Ben. He turned away from the mess, keen to ignore it entirely until one of their little cleaning droids sucked it up and discarded it. If only a droid could whisk away all the evidence Han didn’t want to see, the stuff that was so much bigger than an broken, borderline inappropriate trinket. ”Come on, buddy. It was an ugly thing anyway. Your mom hated it. She’ll be glad it’s gone. No point crying over spilled Keelisian, ah—well… let’s not talk about that just yet.”

Han knew what it meant, this accident, and what had caused it. Of course he did. Deep down inside, he knew it was just one more thing that would one day separate Ben from him. He’d probably always known even though his capacity for self-delusion could be staggering—at least according to Leia. Already she and Luke shared something Han couldn’t access and wouldn’t have wanted even if he could. And now, Ben would be theirs in a way he could never be Han’s simply because the universe willed it to be this way. Han used to think the universe didn’t give half a shit about him and his. Now he wasn’t so sure it wasn’t out to get him and his specifically.

The Force would hurt Ben, Han was pretty sure, the way it had hurt Leia and Luke and every Force-sensitive being who’d been struck down before the Rebellion could save all of their sorry asses from the Empire.

Han would protect him then, if he could, from the dark voids of the galaxy that allowed a creature like Vader to come into existence.

But he couldn’t protect him from the gift, the curse itself, not now, not ever. He’d try—Han would never stop trying, nothing could make him stop trying—but he knew the chances of him succeeding weren’t too great. Nobody needed to tell him _these_ odds. The Force won against all comers. It lived every casino’s dream. It took everything on every play. And even when it gave back, there was a price.

The unfairness of it made indigestion flare in his chest, hot and breathtaking, and the ache of it spread to fill his rib cage like he’d eaten too many Toydarian noodles too quickly and was only just beginning to regret it. How much more painful would it be in the years to come? To know that he had no say in how the universe treated Ben? That the shifting, writhing threads of reality had some plan for him that Han couldn’t upset with a well-timed con?

“It’s okay, you know,” Han said as Ben finally stilled in his arms. His breath shuddered, unsteady, as he tottered on the precipice of a fresh bout of wailing, but he held strong, adopted that preternatural calm that would’ve scared Han if he didn’t love Ben as much as he did. “You’re going to be okay. It’s just a statue.” He repeated the words until he believed them himself.

That was his first mistake.

It will be the only lie he’d ever tell his son, but it was the biggest one of all.


End file.
